Presentation Transcript

eMi Project #5521 :

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Bathroom stops?? Wow, what luxury! …these guys are architects who we met on the bus. They do similar work but on a smaller scale, so we talked about how eMi might help them out.

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Don’t let the cracked windshield fool you, this bus was nice! And the roads were good too.

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Apparently, this bus line needed a new marketing gimmick to change their image of struggling to be on time!

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No signs of injury that we could see, but still scary. These kinds of accidents happen all the time on African roads. We saw a number of them during our travels on this trip.

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Our guesthouse in Livingstone, from the road...

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…the Faulty Towers on the inside – pretty nice for a backpacker’s lodge.

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Arriving at the Royal Livingstone the next day for our trip out to Livingstone Island. This was a 5-star hotel! Too expensive for us to stay at, but nice to walk through.

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The back deck at The Royal Livingstone – the ‘smoke that thunders’ can be seen in the distance.

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Intern Rachel and I waiting for the boat out to Livingstone Island…little did we know what was awaiting us!

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The boat ride out to the island – getting closer to the falls. I made sure there were paddles on board in case the motor died – though we passed several hippos on the short ride out that I’m sure would have been more than happy to help us out in a jam.

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Africans are all about hospitality, so they greeted us on the small island with a sweet, maize drink (non-alcoholic). Delicious!

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Walking on Livingstone Island to the falls.

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Exactly what it means…

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…I told you so!

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Our first look at the South end of Victoria Falls – wow! During the wet season, the rock we’re standing on has 4 feet of water pouring over it and over the falls!

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I took my shoes off because I trusted my bare feet more than Keen sandals! The other side of the chasm is Zimbabwe. Amazing, flat terrain all around, then the earth just opens up!

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Nearing their 70’s, Jim and Mary Ann get the award for world travelers – they’ve been on many eMi trips all over the world! Asked how he handles all of the travel, Jim replies, “Well, I have to be somewhere!”

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Great team photo!

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Ok, this is where is gets interesting! We had something different in mind when the travel agent said ‘swimming in a pool near the falls’!”

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We are swimming across the Zambezi River, roughly 30-40 meters from the 100-meter drop! Yikes!

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Getting our final instructions from the guide…“If you jump too far right, you go over the falls, and no survive!”

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Just where we had the safety talk was ridiculously close to the falls! …this is a bigger waterfall than it looks here!

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…I told you! This shot gives you a little context – before you see what we did next… The “Devil’s Pool”

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No words needed…

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One by one, eight of us jumped! …Jason C.,

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Roger,

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Gene,

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Intern Rachel,

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Intern Melissa,

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Jason P.,

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and Robert!

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An even better team photo!

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My eyes are closed … in prayer for the two guys behind us who weren’t nearly as concerned for their own safety as they were for ours!

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Due to fluctuating water levels, this ‘pool’ is only open between Sept-Dec each year. The water level shown is as high as they will allow for swimming in the ‘Devil’s Pool’ – it had only opened a couple days before we were there!

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Getting out was probably the trickiest part, so they gave us specific instructions. Apparently, one of the guides went over the edge last year saving a tourist who slipped while exiting.

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The dining tent just a few meters from the falls.

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Our breakfast!

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The hotel workers gave us a ride to the falls in their cart. The grounds of the hotel were amazing and even had wildlife roaming (giraffes, zebra, elephants…)

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Roger ‘caught’ this mistake – clearly the builders who installed this sundial were European, since they located the gnomon (vertical piece that casts a shadow in the middle of a sundial) facing 180 degrees backwards (i.e. how you would install it north of the equator!)

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Walking towards the ‘Zambia/Zimbabwe’ border crossing, we met up with lots of street vendors.

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The bridge over the Batoka Gorge at the bottom of Victoria Falls, separating the two countries.

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Me on the bridge – you can see the south end of the falls in the background, nearly completely dried up this time of year.

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The Batoka Gorge at the base of the falls, with the Zambezi river flowing out into Zimbabwe.

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The river flowing out the gorge – see how the landscape is flat and just opens up for the river!

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The bungee swing platform. I’ll swim in the ‘Devil’s Pool’ any day over jumping off this bridge! Just watch…

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Roger bartering with the unrelenting vendors! Nice guys, and they were good at getting us to buy things!

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I kept thinking about which country was in charge of maintaining the bridge, and hoping that one of them actually does!

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A one hundred trillion dollar note from Zimbabwe! It’s no wonder there hasn’t been a legal currency there for nearly 2 years now. Back then, a bottle of soda cost about 9 trillion Zimbabwe dollars! This note was last accepted in 2007.

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It was a long walk (about 2 kilometers) between the borders – not sure why.

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The crew that crossed into Zimbabwe.

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The immigration office on the Zimbabwe side – we liked these contradicting signs!

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The entrance to the national park. Mosi-Oa-Tunya means ‘The Smoke that Thunders’ – Victoria Falls’ local name.

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Cool facts!

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What an amazing aerial view of the falls! Livingstone Island The ‘Devil’s Pool’ Zimbabwe Zambia

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Livingstone Island

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More interesting facts!

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Holy cow, I had no idea the Congo discharged over 10 times as much water as the Nile!

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Viewing the falls from Zimbabwe gives a much better perspective.

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Crossing into Zimbabwe was definitely worth the visa charge and long, hot walk! But we realized something that was a little scary…

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…that’s the ‘Devil’s Pool’!! Yikes!

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That’s a lot of water! Devil’s Pool We swam 30 meters upstream of here! Safety talk was on this rock! Main channel of Victoria Falls.

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I’m talking on the phone to Alisha, who was just starting her school day back home. Needless to say, I felt a little bad!

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The next day was our bonus day since we had to stay one more night to save $400 on our airfare. So the team decided to do a safari in Botswana at Chobe Nat’l Park, which was only an hour’s drive from Livingstone.

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Over 90,000 elephants live in Chobe – the highest concentration of elephants in the world!

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We got to see a large herd cross the river.

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We had two vehicles for our team, plus the guy in blue who was on vacation from New Zealand.

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Chobe is a very dry and sandy place, except down by the Chobe River seen in the distance.

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It was great to be in an elevated, open-air safari vehicle - most of the time that is…

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I am not a fan of viewing elephants up close. This mama and her baby had just crossed in front of us so our driver stopped right next to her. She immediately turned around and stared us down. I wasn’t too happy about being so close, so one of the volunteers snapped this shot of me.

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The elephant was about 10 feet from me! With one small flick she could have flipped our vehicle.

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This was another time where our driver showed he didn’t share my respect for a ‘safe viewing distance’!

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The ground in Chobe in most places was almost entirely sand.

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Cute. Terribly awkward, but very cute.

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These cats are very shy and hard to find! Leopard

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I had a great time during my stay in Namibia …though it only lasted 45 seconds! (I asked our safari boat driver to stop on the other side of the Chobe River, which forms the border between Botswana and Namibia, so I could hop out and claim another flag for my backpack! It’s a stretch, but afterwards I went on and on about ‘my time in Namibia’!)

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The craft market in downtown Livingstone, Zambia. A few differences, but for the most part the same as those in Uganda.

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We spent a lot of time in this plane – 19 hours straight to be exact on our return flight from Johannesburg (via Dakar, Senegal) to Washington DC.